NOTES AND QUERIES. 57 



have a detailed account of the Expedition, but as it surely will not come in 

 a near future, I think a summary of the chief results will be acceptable. 

 The most remarkable were two skins of Anser segetum, both taken in June, 

 1891 (as far as I remember on the 5th and 17th). This makes it probable 

 that it breeds there. So far as I know, these are the first examples taken 

 in Greenland or in America; but as the species commonly breeds in 

 Iceland, it is perhaps remarkable that it has not long ago been met with in 

 Greenland. I also saw a downy young of Branta leucopsis only a few days 

 old. The exact place of capture of this and of the two A. segetum I cannot 

 state precisely — only that it was about 70° N. lat., on the eastern shores of 

 Greenland. Amongst other things which I saw, under the guidance of 

 the Inspector of the Museum, Mr. H. Winge, was a skin from Greenland 

 of the European Hirundo rustica (which I had not ventured to include in 

 my * Birds of Greenland'). Somateria V-nigra, also, must now be admitted 

 as a bird of Greenland. I saw five skins from Godhaab, in South Green- 

 land, taken by Mr. Krabbe. The V-marks of Nos. 1 and 2 were very 

 distinct, as in S. spectabilis ; in No. 5 the mark was not continuous, but 

 consisted of only a few black feathers, which nevertheless were distinctly 

 V-shaped. Nos. 3 and 4 were in transition between Nos. 2 and 5. That 

 they could be hybrids between S. mollissima and 8. spectabilis is quite 

 out of question ; sooner might No. 5 (and perhaps Nos. 4 and 3) be hybrids 

 between S. mollissima and S. V-nigra. In all things — but the V-mark — 

 they seemed to me to be perfectly like S. mollissima, and the transition 

 observable in the skins might indicate that S. V-nigra is not a well-defined 

 species. In conclusion, I may state that in a lot of bird-skins which I 

 have got from Greenland, there is a skin of an adult Crex pratensis taken by 

 Stikkertoppen in South Greenland on May 11th, 1892 ; on the label it is 

 stated to be a male. — A. T. Hageeup (Kolding, Denmark). 



Mortality amongst Short-eared Owls in Scotland.— With the collapse 

 of the Vole-plague, the great horde of Short-eared Owls which concentrated 

 their numbers on the Vole-infested tracts in 1892-93 disappeared in 

 November last. On some of the farms where fifty — or even more — pairs 

 might easily have been counted, it is doubtful if even one pair remained on 

 Nov. 13th. Here and there an odd one might still be found, but these were 

 in most instances quite away from the places so sorely ravaged by the Vole 

 myriads. Within the last fortnight of November I was shown a pair of 

 Short-eared Owls, one of which had been shot as it flew from a tree. On 

 going to pick it up another one was found lying dead just underneath where 

 the first one had been perched. Both were in the last stage of emaciation. 

 A curious fact — which shows how the working of natural laws is always in 

 the direction of keeping down the undue predominance of any particular 

 species — came under my notice the other day in reading a very interesting 

 article in the ' Annals of Scottish Natural History,' by Mr. Peter Adair : — 



ZOOLOGIST, THIRD SERIES, VOL. XVIII. FEB. 1894. F 



